Nokia phones don't like SMS

Various models of Nokia phones are susceptible to a remote exploit by receiving a specially crafted SMS. Phones running Symbian 8 through 9.2 and S60 v2.61 through 3.1, SonyEricsson phones running UIQ are also exploitable.

The attack is “invisible” to the user and causes various problems including the phone refusing to accept further SMS messages and general instability. Soft resetting the phone doesn’t help either, though some versions will work again after a factory reset (which means all user data is lost).

The flaw was reported by the Chaos Communication Congress in Berlin.